Barclays shifting 50 jobs to Frankfurt as Brexit planning accelerates

LONDON (Reuters) - Barclays has begun shifting 40 to 50 investment banking jobs from Britain to Frankfurt as part of its plans to continue doing business in the European Union after Britain leaves the bloc in 2019, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters.

FILE PHOTO: The Barclays logo on the top of one of its branches in Madrid, Spain, March 22, 2016. REUTERS/Sergio Perez/File Photo

The roles will technically be employed by the bank’s main European entity in Ireland, the source said, and form part of the 150-200 jobs that the British bank is transferring to that unit as it implements its Brexit plans.

Banks are pressing ahead with shifting jobs to Europe, in preparation for a ‘worst case’ scenario where Britain fails to secure a Brexit deal with the EU that would allow banks to continue serving Europe from London.

A spokesman for Barclays declined to comment.

Around 5,000 finance jobs will move out of Britain or be created overseas by March 2019 due to Brexit, firms employing the bulk of UK-based workers in international finance told Reuters earlier this year.

Britain and the EU have secured a “standstill” transition deal lasting from the day of Brexit to the end of 2020, but is not due to be ratified until October as part of a broader settlement, meaning it has no legal certainty until then.

Bankers have said that leaves them with no choice but to press on with transferring jobs to the continent.

Paris, Frankfurt and Dublin have emerged as the main beneficiaries of Brexit job moves, with most banks opting to transfer the bulk of affected roles to a European base in one of the three and then adding a smaller number in other hubs.

Barclays has begun discussing the process of shifting the jobs to Frankfurt with affected staff internally, the source said, with most of the positions likely to be filled by new hires rather than transfers.

The first six months of 2018 have seen Britain’s financial job market shrink by an average of 6 percent while Germany’s expanded by the same amount, data from job search platform Joblift showed.